


Across The Universe

by jambal



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock - Fandom
Genre: BBC Sherlock - Freeform, Comfort, Developing Relationship, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Falling In Love, First Love, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Friendship/Love, M/M, POV Second Person, Sherlock-centric, Stars, night sky
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-02
Updated: 2012-12-02
Packaged: 2017-11-20 01:22:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,392
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/579745
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jambal/pseuds/jambal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A relationship can span a lifetime, but if you're lucky it can span light years.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Across The Universe

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ConsultingWarlock](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ConsultingWarlock/gifts).



> This was written for Flora for her birthday. I love her very much and I hope she likes it.
> 
> I'd also like to thank (as usual) Aisu, for reading this monstrosity and giving me the confidence to actually post it. The girl is my rock.

 

 

_Stars, hide your fires;_

_Let not light see my black and deep desires._

_The eye wink at the hand; yet let that be_

_Which the eye fears, when it is done, to see._

_\- Macbeth, Act I Scene IV_

 

“Beautiful, isn’t it?” 

 

Your words break through the night air and the clouds of unease dissipate and clear the way to paint the sky with proclamations of love and adoration and an understanding that is quickly bypassing the realm of astronomy and reason; it curveballs towards appreciation and silence. Vast spaces of silence and the soft beating of hearts and breathy words on necks and lingering kisses on private places, secret places and places of worship.

You continue to gaze at the night sky before you, the stars so bright and abundantly bigger than they appear, they’re being so bright that it looks like they are holes in the floor of heaven. So bright that they dusk the night sky in a collection of speckles like those dusting a newly laid egg, fragile and monumentally important and earth shatteringly profound that they hold the key to unlock answers to all of those questions. Those questions which plague us and cloud our minds and we forget how to breathe, we forget how to appreciate the bigger things, those better things, like the night sky.

The night sky and views of celestial bodies; stars, the Moon, and planets that becomes visible on a clear night after the Sun has set. Natural light, the sources found in a night sky; moonlight, starlight, and airglow and those fiery balls of matter which culminate in the most tangible of the intangible. You would lie on the grass as a boy and try to touch the balls of fire which were the source of many conversations, testimonials and confessions. They were a silent confidant and they kept you safe, they kept your secrets and they kept you together. They kept you grounded before your life changed and everything became bigger and brighter and faster and louder and much more important. The work was all that mattered and you forgot about the company you used to keep, the thousands of silent friends who would shimmer and dim with each utterance, and so they did dim, they burned out and the fire in your life was gone, for a long time. But now, you’re looking at the sky and you see the stars, but it’s not the stars that are the source of your many conversations, testimonials and confessions. No longer are they the confidant in your life; no longer do they keep you safe, keep your secrets and keep you together. Yet here you are, you’re gazing at the stars and they’re as bright as they were when you used to whisper to them, they’re still as attentive as if you never left them, and yet you haven’t returned to them because you’re looking at them and you’re thinking of him.

“I thought you didn’t care about –“

And he speaks, he interrupts your silent, almost soliloquy and he bulldozes your senses and he’s much vaster, much more important and much more dazzling than those twinkling balls of fire, he’s shivering and he’s walking closely beside you and he doesn’t understand. He will never comprehend his own importance, his own status as the one fixed point in a forever changing world, a corrupted world which can be devastating and is devastating and will always devastate. He’s glancing up towards you and he has a small smile pulling on his lips, that smile is for you, if you care. Of course you care because you let out another sigh and his arm brushes yours, fingers almost touching, but not quite. 

His attention is still on you and he’s curious, he sees more of you, isn’t that exciting? Isn’t that what you wanted? He’s looking at you and it’s as though he can see it all, of course he cannot, but his eyes are almost pleading as you continue to gaze at the night sky, if only you could see him right now, staring at you. He hasn’t looked at anyone that way before, you’re important to him. You’re his starry night, dark and vast and unimaginably persistent. You’re doing things to him, things only you can understand and yet you won’t look, you won’t see this moment – he’s looking at you as if this moment will be swallowed up by the darkness and perhaps it will, because it is getting very dark. 

Wait, the sky isn’t as dark any more, it’s cloudy and it’s raining, but he’s still there, gazing up at you. That’s not right, that isn’t what you should be thinking about right now, you’re standing and the crosswind is almost enough to push you off the edge, but you won’t, not yet. It’s too soon. Stop it, you’re looking at the night sky and John is close by your side, two bodies and two souls, blood pumping and hearts beating and that’s all the incentive you need, really. 

Just look at him, do it before it’s too late, because one day it will be too late and this moment will only be a distant memory. You can catalogue it, relive it and cherish it, but it will only be a memory. This man beside you may not be as alive as he is now and you know it, there’s a change coming and you can almost feel it in the air, it takes the breath from your lungs a little.

“Doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate it.”

This time you do look at him, and see, isn’t it worth it? He’s staring at you and he’s smiling and that smile is a lifetime of comfort and contentment. You don’t smile back, you don’t have to, he knows. Look at him. He knows. You both continue to walk, side by side, in silence. The silence stretches on and it spans the length of the vast sky, perhaps this is the culmination of events that means the end of the fire. Or perhaps this is just the beginning. Either way you still reach out your hand and he’s right there, solid and real and tangible, he’s cold but the blood is pumping through him and his hand fits yours perfectly, he squeezes your hand gently and you both let go and continue to walk in silence, towards the darkness, towards something new, most definitely towards something dangerous and isn’t that the point? It may be towards the inevitable and you may have just begun the end, but he’s right there beside you and he’s smiling. Isn’t that all you need? 

You don’t tell him about the stars, you don’t even tell him that it really was never about the stars, you don’t need to. He’s right there and as you walk together, into the darkness, you know that he will always be there. He will always be by your side and there’s not a thing you can do to stop him, remember he’s a soldier, he’s killed people – you laugh at the thought, however, your John has killed _for_ you, that first night and he would kill for you again, he would continue killing for you until the end of your days. Your days, you both together, because really there is no other option than to admit defeat and succumb to this partnership because there’s nothing more you can say or do that will scare him away, he’s the one fixed point in a changing age and he is very much yours, as terrifying as it is, remember that you don’t deserve him, you never will, but you know that and you will fight everyday to ensure that he doesn’t leave you, because he really should. 

He won’t leave you, though. You may not deserve him but that man chose you and you chose him and even if it was by accident and even if he hasn’t fully comprehended the enormity of this partnership, he will in time and although that time will signify the end, just remember the night you both gazed at the stars and nothing else in the world came close to penetrating that moment, nothing ever will and if that doesn’t suggest eternity then just gaze up at the sky and whisper a quiet plea to your old friends.

 

 

 

_ _


End file.
